A Promise to Honor
by ResidentOwl
Summary: Emily fell. All that was left of her was a scream, the name of the man who promised to always protect her, whipped away by the gales. She fell. And Corvo followed. He closed his eyes, and opened them to see Daud's blade sheathed in Jessamine's body, a whisper on her lips, the name of the man who promised to protect her and her child. A promise he would honor to his last breath.
It was a mistake. It was all a mistake.

Choices cruelly decided that shaped the future into a dark, malevolent, venomous thing; a city plagued with rats, weepers, and the colorfully intricate masks that disguise the pungent scent of fear and desperation in the streets and behind richly stained doors.

 _The boldest measures are the safest._ But even the boldest measures couldn't keep the disease-ridden rat-infested death at bay when it lurked in the darkest, filthiest alleys of Dunwall. The boldest measures couldn't keep the city from begging for deliverance when the man in Death's mask fell upon the City Watch, the Overseers, the Gangs, staining the cobblestone red, and the bodies of loved one's became the decadent feast for rats.

Days later, the families — _who ever was left—_ would receive a letter claiming that their brother or father or son or disguised sister deserted their post. There was no body, just disgrace. The family would receive no money, food, nor elixir as was promised when their loved one enlisted. The oldest, weakest, youngest, would be the first to succumb, just a cough, just a tickling in the back of the throat they will assure the others. But they all knew. Death was coming, one way or another.

There was no retribution for one such as he: a blade in the crowd, a creature more than a man, a great being that embodied bloodlust and the dark shadows of vengeance, a fragmented shard of blood-stained glass of the once good man that loved and was loved in return.

A shard that warped under the hot knife in Coldridge. A shard that fractured beneath the saccharine words of divine retribution from the _Loyalists—it is as she would have wanted_. A shard that was honed and slipped between the ribs of the aristocracy, cleaving the delicate power balance in half, and spilled the intestines of the rat-infested corruption.

A shard of brittle, stained glass that shattered with the scream of a little girl he couldn't save.

It was a mistake. It was his fault.

And Emily — _innocent, clever, little Emily—_ took the fall for it.

And so, through Corvo's choices, through the work of blood tipped fingers of those who pulled the strings behind red curtains, the bright future of the little girl who would be Empress was taken out of her delicate hands.

She fell.

What she could have been— _an Empress, loved and feared in equal measure, both ruthless and kind—_ , all of those plague afflicted citizen she could have saved, the future of the Empire was lost when her fingers slipped on the metal grated walkway high above the unforgiving stone.

The years of growing up under the watchful eye of her father-figure, decades of soft smiles and breathless laughter, and the future of seeing the small girl who was forced to grow too quickly becoming the kind-hearted loving Empress that her mother would be proud of, all of it, lost in a moment.

Lost the moment her fingers slipped, lost the moment her Mother died on the sword of an assassin with cold eyes, lost the moment Corvo— _loved but shattered, he can do no wrong in her eyes—_ stepped out of Coldridge with vengeance and bloodlust filling the dark hollow in his chest that once housed love and kindness.

He was a changed man. She was a girl who desperately held on to what was left of her life. And after all was said and done, once all the corrupted blood had been spilt, there was no one left to save.

It was a moment of indecision, a mistake. He was in the doorway that led to the walkway. Havelock pulled Emily to his chest as she struggled valiantly, the heels of his polished boots hanging over the edge. Corvo drew his crossbow and knew that with barely fifteen paces between them, he could hit his target.

Havelock's head fell back as a bolt penetrated his skull between the his wildly desperate eyes, blood slipping out of the would and down his face like twin trails of tears, dripping onto the metal walkway. He toppled backward, Emily's arm still in his loose grip as he body went lax.

Emily screamed. Corvo ran. Her fingers grasped desperately at the edge; Havelock already fallen into the thick fog below.

Ten steps away. Corvo dropped his sword and crossbow, the pounding in his ears drowning out the metal clatter.

Her hand swiped through the few drops of blood Havelock spilled.

Five steps away. Corvo reaches forward, outsider's mark laid bare and refusing to react; he was out of mana. He pleaded desperately for time to stop, for it to slow, anything. Emily was the last thing he had left; his life, his hope, and his reason for existence.

She flailed for a moment as her hands slips, her fingertips stained bright red.

Two steps away.

Emily falls, screaming the name of the man who promised to always protect her, her dishonored Royal Protector. She screamed the name Jessamine pleaded with her last breath.

 _"CORVO,"_ Her last breath was a scream of terror, of promises made and broken, of futures dim and lost.

And Emily was gone. Her last plea whipped away by the gales, scattering the remnants of her desperation across the four isles for all her subjects to bear witness. Her body consumed by the gray fog below, saving Corvo from witnessing the broken body of the last of his compassion and humanity hit the unforgiving stone. _He doesn't feel saved._

Corvo halted just before the edge, falling to his knees; his hands gripped the cold edge with white knuckles, the remains of Havelock stained the palm of his hand red. He stared uncomprehendingly down at the gray fog that obscured his vision, obscured the truth of his utter failure.

He eyes flitted madly back and forth, searching in the gray for something he has no name for: hope, deliverance, certainty. He caught of glimpse of his mark, the cursed Outsider's Mark. What good was all the runes, the death, the abilities, when Emily was…

Corvo tiled his head back at the gray sky, threatening to storm. His right hand covered the mark, nails biting harshly into the blackened flesh of the Outsider's Claim. Heart pounding desperately in his chest, staring blankly at the sky, his ragged finger nails ripped and tore at the mark.

His breath jolted in his chest, and he screamed. A wretched sound that echoed across the island for the few left alive to listen, a wail of a grieving inhuman creature.

Madness ripped at the edges of his mind; he couldn't comprehend what he lost, what he had, what he'd chosen to become. Blood spilled from the back of his hand, his own flesh beneath his fingernails, his own blood staining his hands a deeper shade than a hundred watchmen.

And his scream died away.

Corvo's hands— _dripping, drenched as always with his choices_ — pulled the mask of Death away and all that was left was a shattered man, the creature he had mutilated himself into becoming. The broken pieces had fallen one by one with each life he stole, leading a path back to his humanity and compassion he refused to acknowledge. It too late.

 _You cannot save her_.

There was nothing left.

Corvo staggered to his feet, a feeling of vertigo overwhelming him as he peered over the edge into the grey below. The cold metal of his mask slipped through his fingers, red still dripping into the impenetrable depths. It was consumed before Corvo even realized it was lost.

Corvo closed his eyes and leaned forward into empty space.

The wind whipped away the blood still oozing sluggishly from his hand. He was weightless, waiting until he, too, was consumed.

A calm came over his mind, a stark contrast to the turmoil that had abused him since he was sent away to beg aid from the other cities. Almost a year, and look how far he had fallen.

Look how far he has yet to fall.

With his mind calmed, he waited for his retribution for the chaos he's wrought.

He waited for his deliverance.

He waited to see Emily and Jessamine once again.

* * *

 _"Oh, Corvo."_

The Outside watched — _he was always watching—,_ his endless gaze roaming over the remains of a man who would have been so interesting. Corvo would have been an entertaining figure for decades to come, had he made different choices.

As it was, The Outsider was somewhat disappointed with this ending.

This was an unlikely future, one that was stained darkly and frayed at the edges, tied closely with madness and carelessness. The City of Dunwall would be consumed by the sea after the desperate and the poor picked over the remnants of the rich streets, after the plague had ravaged and died.

The Outsider knew how the story closed, and with most of his marked falling to the hands of others there was nothing of interest left in Dunwall. Daud had peeked his interest after years of insipid actions, but he fell under the blade of the man whose life he ruined. Even after his twisted attempt at redemption, he fell to fulfill a portion of Corvo's endless vengeance.

The Being sighed as Corvo's scream of anguish rent the delicate serenity of The Void, a becalmed ocean before a blessed storm. He turned away from the predictable sight to consult the potential futures that could have been and could be.

The Outsider was surprised, not that it showed beside a slight tilt of the head and a narrowing of those dark fathomless eyes. This ending, the resolution of Corvo's story, led to a rather dull future. People prospered as the isles broke into separate countries without much resistance; the rat plague would die out as the people of Dunwall succumbed to sickness. The aristocracy would dissolve into pitiful power plays as they attempted to keep the Empire together through sheer force of will, of course, they cannot build a lasting reign upon crumbling stone.

If nothing changed, there wouldn't be an interesting human for more than a century. Of course, there was the occasional desperate person, and the few that would fall into witchcraft with or without his mark, but those were common anomalies.

In the threads of potential futures, The Outsider couldn't see anyone nearly as fascinating or influential as Corvo was to Dunwall and the Empire.

How very dull.

The Outsider caught a stray thought as Corvo tipped over the edge into oblivion.

 _—to see Jessamine and Emily once more—_

The Leviathan tilted his head, his eyes inscrutable as he stared at the tangled web of lost futures, a mess of lives cut short and choices never given the chance to be made.

All it would take was a knot.

A bit of direct intervention.

There was nothing remotely entertaining happening for more than a century, a long time to wait in The Void even for an omnipotent being like him. The choice made, he smirked as he manipulated the web of potential future, plucking the small darkened thread and tying it back on itself.

The Outsider stepped back to watch the show.

 _Do try to be more entertaining this time, Corvo._

* * *

 _"Do try to be more entertaining this time, Corvo"_ It was a whisper whipped away through the wind as Corvo fell.

The howling gales were silenced.

Corvo felt himself pinned to a column with the wind suddenly knocked out of him, held up by some supernatural force. He struggled instinctively against the powerful force.

His eyes shot open.

A sharp crack pierced through the pounding in his ears, Jessamine held a hand to her cheek after Daud backhanded her across the face. He grabbed her by the neck, pushing her roughly against the stone railing.

Corvo knew what was coming, he struggled, trying to call the Outsider's power to push the Whaler aside, to call a rat infestation upon Daud, to bend time, to do _something._ But his hand was still bleeding and the mark didn't react to his plea.

 _"You cannot save her."_

Daud stabbed her, just like before.

 _No._

"Corvo!" Jessamine called desperately, a thousand pleas and a hundred apologies in a single word.

Emily screamed, "Mommy!" as one of the assassins grabbed her. She struggled desperately like she had against Havelock, "Get away!" And then she was gone, again, taken by the Whalers to be handed off to Burrows.

Corvo was dropped as the assassin's traversed away. He shook off the sudden vertigo and crawled toward Jessamine who was reaching out to him. Tears pricking his eyes as he watched her fade into the Void and Emily stolen again, he cradled her gently in his arms.

"Corvo… it's all… coming apart."

 _It already came apart, at the seams, the world, the city, I came apart when you died. I'm still falling apart._

"Find… Find Emily. Protect her."

 _I promise. I promise. I promise. I promise. I promise. I promise. I wish it meant something. I failed. I'm sorry. I failed._

"You're the only one. You'll know what to do."

 _I failed. I'm sorry. I didn't know what to do. Why did you put your faith in me. I failed._

"Won't you? Corvo?"

And with her last breath, she uttered his name. A promise, a plea, an apology, and forgiveness in a single word. He didn't deserve it, not after everything he did, not after his actions tarnished her name and what she gave him.

Corvo saw Burrows, Campbell, and the city watchmen approaching, but he refused to look away from the remains of Jessamine in his arms, the pool of blood that stained his knees already cooling.

He kissed her forehead and whispered "farewell," a tender gesture, one of the many actions he regretted not doing once he had ample time to contemplate within the grey walls of Coldridge.

 _I promise. I swear._

Corvo rose, feeling stronger and more whole than he had in months, even as Jessamine's body lay crumpled and cooling at his feet.

He had lost sight before, of the promise he made, of the trust and faith Jessamine had placed in a whole and good man. Jessamine trusted him, and he broke that trust when he let bloodlust and vengeance overwhelm his morality and good sense. He became the weapon the Loyalists wanted, a mask of death, a broken fragment of a good man that influenced the end of the Empire.

The guard accused him of murder, again, both Campbell and Burrows acting surprised and appalled, but they couldn't hide the shine of triumph in their eyes.

Corvo clenched his hands into a fists to hide the shaking, blood still oozed from the furrows on the back of his hand. The Outsiders Mark shone darkly through the stained and damaged skin.

 _I will not fail this time._

It was a promise to Emily, who was scared and traumatized but depended on Corvo, the last remaining piece of her childhood.

It was a promise to Jessamine, who lay dead once more through some twisted scheme of The Outsider.

It was a promise to himself, a man broken but maybe not beyond repair.

" _Let's see where this leads, my dear Corvo."_

* * *

 **A/N:** Hello, awesome readers! I hope you enjoyed reading this one-shot. I'm thinking about making this into a series, a fix-it fic for High Chaos Corvo, but it won't follow the game except in the loosest sense. Maybe a bit more Daud and the Outsider... Anyway, let me know what you think!

Comments and Critiques are appreciated.

-Rezz


End file.
